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Boer victim to gunman: Sir are you going to execute me?

Restaurant owner Wouter Myburgh to the black gunman who’d just shot him in the head: 'Sir....are you going to execute me?'

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Pretoria - Fearing imminent execution, a Pretoria man addressed the robber who had just shot him in the head as “sir” and asked him if he had any children, the Pretoria High Court heard on Tuesday.’Restaurant owner Wouter Myburgh, who survived the headshot during an armed attacky at his home in Amandasig, was testifying in the trial of six black men accused of a series of violent house robberies north of Pretoria in May and June 2008.

Accused are Chicco Masemola, Socket Masemola, Thabo Diale, Lucas Mampane, Amos Matsimela and Aaron Mashiloane - all in their twenties and early thirties – and they pleaded not guilty to charges ranging from robbery with aggravating circumstances to attempted murder, rape and the unlawful possession of firearms and ammunition.

Myburgh testified: “I was concerned he was going to execute me and addressed him as sir. I asked him twice: 'Sir... Are you going to execute me?', but he told me to shut the f**k up,” he said. Myburgh saw two of the men carrying his plasma television. The attackers also demanded his jewellery. He showed them his watches and told them about an expensive wedding ring he kept in his vehicle.

“They guy next to me said where's my wife and I said I was divorced. I asked him if he had kids, but he said: 'Shhh'. I was getting worried, because at that stage I was lying in a puddle of blood. I decided to try and expedite things and told them about other valuables. This seemed to calm them down and I could feel them tying my hands and feet.

“The man with the gun told me he had six children. I said: 'Sir, then you must be very blessed'... After that he said he'd decided not to kill me and I must stay quiet for 15 minutes after they'd left,” Myburgh testified.

After freeing himself, Myburgh ran to a neighbour's house for help. His neighbour wrapped towels around his head and took him to hospital.

Myburgh, who showed the court where the bullet had entered and exited the back of his head after apparently being deflected by his skull, said he spent four days in intensive care and battled to turn his head for a long time after the incident.

Chicco Masemola has denied all knowledge of the four robberies he was charged with. They include that of Myburgh and of a white couple in Orchards, in which the woman was tied up and raped in front of her husband...

The term "genocide" was coined by legal scholar Raphael Lemkin in 1943, writing:

'Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actionsaiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves.

The objectives of such a plan would be the disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of personal security, liberty, health, dignity and lives of the members of such groups... '